


Lies You Hide Behind

by SublimeDiscordance



Series: On Life's Weary Seas [1]
Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Anal Sex, Angst, Explicit Sexual Content, Ghost Drifting, Ghost Drifting During Sex, Gift Fic, Hansencest - Freeform, Incest, M/M, Oral Sex, POV Raleigh Becket, POV Third Person, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Porn With Plot, Prompt Fill, Raleigh/Hansencest, Rimming, Smut, The Drift (Pacific Rim), chaleigh
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-27
Updated: 2014-01-27
Packaged: 2018-01-10 05:39:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,803
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1155761
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SublimeDiscordance/pseuds/SublimeDiscordance
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Herc gets tired of waiting for Raleigh and Chuck to make up after their fight. So, like any good father and friend, he forces the issue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lies You Hide Behind

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Airwing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Airwing/gifts).



> So, my friend Airwing (to whom this story is dedicated) sent me a prompt on Friday and I absolutely HAD to fill it. In part, not going to lie, because he's agreed to beta my Pac Rim fics in the future : D Horray! So, in a way, this is me saying thanks. It's also a thanks for the fantastic Chaleigh he wrote for me a few days ago ^_^ ~~I still can't believe I wrote this in two days holy crap you guys~~
> 
> Anywho, for those of you waiting for the next chapter to Nothing Here Is Cruel Or Kind, well, all I can say is that I'm working on it. I'm sorry, I wish I could be more specific. ~~please don't hate me~~
> 
> The original prompt was as follows: "Herc gets sick of Chuck and Raleigh's fighting so he decides to teach them a lesson of respect and comraderie through some intimacy/sexy times and it has to happen in the privacy of Striker Eureka late at night when nobody is around. Chaleigh/hansencest. Go. :) and yes there is plenty of room inside Striker's conn pod for sexy times :p"
> 
> Obviously, I played around with that a little bit (I got permission, though, so it's all good).
> 
> Title comes from the Oceanlab song “Secret.” 
> 
> Beta and Cover credit: [Airwing](/users/Airwing)
> 
>  
> 
> Epigraph:  
> “ _I know you feel you need to prove_  
>  _That you are good at simply everything you try to do…_  
>  _Leave your armor behind_  
>  _Free your vulnerable mind._ ”  
> —“I Am What I Am” by Oceanlab

This is a horrible idea.

Raleigh allows that thought to simmer at the back of his mind as the unfamiliar conn pod hums to life around him, holographic displays initializing and displaying readouts of various bits and pieces of information he’s sure would make more sense to him if this was his own damn Jaeger. The AI helpfully chirps that the pilot-to-pilot connection protocol sequence has been booted up and is ready to initiate at LOCCENT’s command. Dread fills Raleigh’s stomach at the words, and he reaches up and taps the intercom again, trying to reason with the man who has forced him into this situation.

“Herc, c’mon man, is this really—”

“Becket,” the elder Hansen’s voice cuts him off, tone far more menacing than Raleigh would’ve thought possible given that he can’t actually _see_ the man. “Do me a favor and shut up, would ya?”

Raleigh sighs and drops his hand, bracing himself in the harness in preparation for the drop onto the Jaeger’s body. A part of him wonders how the hell Herc is managing to control so many functions from LOCCENT that would’ve taken a whole team of techs if this were Gipsy—among them, sealing the conn pod and securing them in their harnesses. He soon realizes, though, that, as Striker is a Mark V, the builders probably wanted to reduce the amount of time and effort necessary to suit up a team and therefore automated as much as they possibly could. He looks over at Chuck Hansen where the other man is strapped into the harness to Raleigh’s left, his pockmarked, dull green camo drivesuit a sharp contrast to the  shiny, black one Raleigh is wearing.

“This is all your fault, I hope you know,” he grumbles loudly enough to be heard over the sound of more systems whirring to life around them.

“Yeah, fuck you too, mate,” Chuck says back, eyes flashing behind his faceplate. “Not like this was _my_ bloody idea. ‘Drift it out.’ I swear he’s gone senile.”

‘Drift it out’ was the way Herc had phrased his command to Raleigh and Chuck an hour ago when he’d pulled both of them out of their bunks. Apparently, the Hansen elder had decided that, since Raleigh and Chuck were going to be working and fighting together in a matter of days—possibly a matter of hours—then they damn well needed to get along. Or, at the very least, _trust_ each other, even if only enough to not die on purpose. Their fight earlier that day had steeled the older man’s resolve that they were both behaving like spoiled children—though, in his defense, Raleigh didn’t normally take a swing at someone who pissed him off; even so, there was something about Chuck that just _got under his skin_ —and Herc had decided that they both needed someone to step in and get their heads screwed on straight.

Apparently, being forced to drift with someone you practically hated was considered an intervention.

The older man had retrieved them both from their rooms with no small amount of force, throwing them bodily into the assembly room with the pieces of their drivesuits.

“You know how to put them on,” he’d told them. “Strip and seal each other up. Be in the pod in twenty minutes, or I’ll come find you.”

“What about—?” Raleigh had started, but Herc had overridden him.

“Choi owes me a favor. LOCCENT will be empty. Dun’ worry, no one’s gonna witness you two idiots being adults for once in your lives, ‘cept me. Move yer arses. Pod’s dropping in twenty-five.”

Not wanting to incur Herc’s wrath further, they’d done exactly what they’d been told. As he’d stripped off his sweats and pulled out the circuitry-laden cloth that made up the bulk of the suit’s underarmor, Raleigh could’ve sworn he’d felt Chuck’s eyes on him. However, when he’d turned to look, the redhead had been pulling on his own suit’s version of the undergarments, the tan cloth being stretched over planes of muscle that Raleigh had found himself admiring despite himself. Though he would die before admitting it, the Hansen kid was undeniably attractive. He was also, almost unfortunately, exactly Raleigh’s type. Yancy had been the first to describe said type: muscle-bound assholes who Raleigh thought could challenge him. Shaking his head to quell the disquieting thoughts, he’d hurriedly pulled the black shirt over his head and had pulled on the pants and gloves before glancing back at Chuck to see the younger man holding the various pieces of camo-printed armor. The Australian’s face had been twisted in an expression that reminded Raleigh of the time Yancy had come to him when they were younger and asked him for help with a school project.

“If I tell ya how t’ stick ‘em on,” Chuck had muttered, not looking Raleigh in the eye but instead keeping his gaze fixed somewhere by the blond’s elbow, “d’ya think you can do it without breaking the damn things? I know how t’do yours; they’re simple.”

Raleigh had rolled his eyes and taken the armor from Chuck’s hands, following the redhead’s instructions as best as he could—though when he failed to do so precisely as he’d been told, he found himself on the receiving end of a disgruntled sigh and several choice phrases, despite his counter-argument that he’d never used the tools scattered throughout the room before. After Raleigh had sealed Chuck into his armor, the Australian had kept his word and sealed Raleigh into his own with quick, precise motions. Strangely, they had pulled their helmets on at the same time, and the relay gel had cleared from Raleigh’s visor in just enough time to allow him to see Chuck still pointedly not looking at him.

He’d returned the favor, silently stalking into Striker’s conn pod and taking up the right hand position, both deferring to his knowledge of Chuck’s preference for the left and acknowledging the fact that his own left side still is, as he’d told Mako, “kinda shot.”  They’d strapped themselves in and allowed Herc to control the startup sequences. “I’ve jockeyed ‘er enough I know damn well how to turn the ol’ girl on, Becket,” the older pilot had replied acerbically when Raleigh asked if the older pilot knew what he was doing.

Which is what brought Raleigh and Chuck to their current situation: waiting for Herc to give them the signal and initiate the drop and connect the conn pod to Striker’s waiting body. Of course, the two of them are still bickering.

“Alright boys, hold on to your fat heads,” is all the warning they get from Herc before Raleigh feels the machinery holding the conn pod in place release and they’re suddenly plummeting downward. No matter how many times he’d done this before, Raleigh never quite gets used to the momentary feeling of weightlessness, nor can he resist the small thrill of excitement that goes through him. Beside him, though, Chuck gives out an almost involuntary whoop of excitement, and Raleigh’s gaze snaps over to the Australian to see a toothy grin—a genuine fucking _smile_ —on the younger pilot’s face, eyes sparkling in something that, if Raleigh didn’t know better, he might’ve called _joy_.

It’s almost like looking through a window into the past.

It makes something in Raleigh’s gut tighten.

He’s jarred out of his musings when the conn pod’s hydraulic cradle catches it scant feet before making contact with Striker. The softened collision with something so much larger, so much more massive, than himself is a comforting sensation in its own way, despite the fact that he can almost _feel_ the difference in size between Striker and Gipsy through the contact. He has a moment of disorientation when the conn pod starts settling in its housing without rotating. Chuck must catch sight of his furrowed forehead, because he explains, almost mildly, smile still in evidence, “The Jaeger rotates around the conn pod, not the other way around.” And then, because he’s Chuck Hansen and is apparently incapable of _not_ being an ass at all times, he adds, “Better than that old rust bucket you pilot, eh?”

Of course. Raleigh forces out a disgruntled noise from the back of his throat, not trusting his words to adequately explain himself when, in a few minutes, they’re going to be swimming in each other’s thoughts. Speaking of which…

He thumbs the intercom one last time.

“Herc, how do you even know this is gonna work?”

Beside him, Chuck does the same.

“Y’know you can’t just force people to drift, old man. What gives?”

Herc’s response crackles through the speakers. “You’re both stubborn sons of bitches. If anyone can drift, it’ll be you two. Now, for the last time, shut up. Your cufflink is good, boys. Initiating neural handshake protocols. Good luck.” The comm goes dead with an annoyed blip.

The AI cheerfully informs them that the pilot-to-pilot connection initiation sequence has begun and starts up a countdown of thirty seconds. Raleigh looks over at Chuck, who simply drops his hand back to his side and stares at the ground, looking some strange combination of defeated and pissed off. Then again, Raleigh supposes, the younger pilot _always_ looks pissed at _something_ , at least when Raleigh’s around, so perhaps that’s just how he looks when he feels defeated? Or, perhaps, the blond finds himself musing with a thin thread of amusement coiling through his chest, that’s just the way he _always_ looks.

Twenty-five seconds.

“Look,” Raleigh starts, “I know neither of us really want this, but—”

Chuck silences him with a glare, then looks back down.

Twenty seconds.

“You have no idea who I am, Becket,” the younger pilot grits out. “What I’ve been through. What I’ve done. Don’t act like you know me.”

Fifteen seconds.

The twisting in his gut sharpens and churns, and Raleigh feels more than hears the words as they slip past his lips. “I’m sorry.”

Chuck’s head jerks up to look at him in something close to alarm, the younger pilot’s posture stiffening in his drivesuit.

“What?”

Ten seconds.

“I’m sorry. For that. And for what you’re probably about to see.”

Five seconds.

“Mate, what the hell do you—”

“ _Neural interface drift, initiated_.”

Raleigh is sucked into a world of chaos and anger, of disjointed sounds and sights and smells and tastes and—

Images, real or imagined he has no idea, flicker past his awareness—a small boy crying in his father’s arms, sitting in front of the television with a laughing family, sparring in the kwoon—before he even has time to try and associate them as his or _other_. It’s too much, too fast. He can _feel_ the _other_ presence floating alongside him, but they don’t seem to be able to merge, to mesh, to change from you and me to _youandme_. It’s not until he catches sight of Yancy that he realizes he and Chuck are glossing over a chunk of his own memories: him and Yancy tossing back shots in some seedy bar in Anchorage after their first kill; Yancy pinning Raleigh to the metal floor of their room and finally winning their wrestling match for the top bunk; Yancy as he hovers over—

 _No_. Raleigh forcefully jerks the drift away from that thought, and he can almost feel the subtle shift in the memories as Chuck’s parade in front of him as an incomprehensible storm of sensation.

They trade off like this, each unwilling to let the other in, but each time they do Raleigh can feel his control falter. It’s getting harder and harder to keep his companion’s sight away from the things he’d rather keep buried—from the things he’d rather not expose _anyone_ to—and he feels a thread of anxiousness curl in his gut at the realization. This isn’t how a drift is supposed to go. They’re not supposed to constantly wrestle around merging with one another, around trying to do something as simple yet horrible difficult as _trusting_ each other. It’s supposed to be a quick, seamless process, and the fact that Raleigh _still_ is almost completely unaware of what Chuck is feeling, except for the most general sensation of his emotional state, is a bad sign. That same sensation tells him that Chuck is feeling something similar to the dread weaving through Raleigh’s mind, although it’s all at once sharper and more focused.

The turning point, though, comes when Raleigh catches sight of something that is decidedly _not_ from his own mind, and he latches on to it.

It’s an image, dulled at the edges—a memory of a dream instead of real life, perhaps?—that looks startlingly familiar to their current circumstances. Except, of course, for several key differences. In it, Raleigh and Chuck are both in Striker’s conn pod, systems already brought to life as evidenced by the multicolored lights that flash over them. One of these key difference is that Herc is there, too, standing off to the side and watching them with an approving smile on his face.

Another is the fact that neither of them are wearing anything. And the way Raleigh is driving himself into Chuck in a punishing rhythm where the younger pilot is laid out on his back, his cries of ecstasy echoing in the small space despite the low hum of Striker’s systems.

He feels his sensation of Chuck bristle and then become flooded with embarrassment, and the image starts to crack at the edges as Chuck tries to force him away. Instead, Raleigh holds on tighter. He looks at the way Chuck’s face is so _open_ in this fantasy, the way the younger pilot never breaks eye contact with the projection of Raleigh, and how, in a motion that surprises the older man, the vision of Chuck reaches forward and pulls Raleigh’s head down to smash their lips together in a kiss that is both frightening and arousing in its intensity. From where he’s watching, Raleigh can see Chuck’s teeth working at his lips, can hear his own mixed sounds of pleasure and pain as the Australian bites down, can see the way his hips stutter in their relentless motions, and he whispers words—of filth or sweetness, he’s not sure—into Chuck’s mouth, the words trapped between their joined lips and sliding tongues. And, suddenly, he can _feel_ it, too, as Chuck would’ve in the dream. He can feel himself being spread open by the cock inside of him, can feel every vein pulse in time with the heartbeat of the man above him, can feel the pleasure jolt down his spine every time the swollen head rubs against his prostate, pulling needy noises from his throat.

Raleigh isn’t sure whether it’s simply because he held on, or because he’s clearly _not_ disgusted by what he’s experiencing, but he can feel Chuck’s shame quickly give way to surprise.

And, in that moment, they drift.

Their senses of self collide, melding and merging and coming together in a way that is wholly impossible to describe with words alone. The feeling of suddenly being of one mind with another human being is a sensation Raleigh has never, even in the seven years since he joined the PPDC, been able to describe to someone else. The closest he’s ever come is calling it a kind of sex, yet it’s so much _more_ : more intimate, more exhilarating; more personal.

In the background he hears Herc’s voice over the comms, congratulating them on the fact that they’ve finally stabilized, and the AI asking if they’d like to initiate pilot-to-Jaeger connection protocols. He also hears his own breathing as it speeds up, and his heartbeat pulsing in his ears.

He blocks all of it out, though, and gazes over at the man to whom he’s currently linked, watching as Chuck does the same. Raleigh spares a brief thought to wonder if his face has the same awestruck expression on it before he and Chuck both murmur a soft, “I’m sorry,” and then they’re falling back into each other’s memories as they swim over their joined consciousness. It’s, in a word, incredible. It’s the second time Raleigh has ever drifted with someone with whom he doesn’t actually _share_ memories, and he finds their pasts, their hopes, their thoughts, all rushing over him in a flurry of images that seems to last forever and a single instant. He feels like maybe they’re chasing the RABIT, but dismisses the thought what feels like a second later. He’s chased RABITs before. He was linked to Mako when she did the same. He knows what it feels like. This is nothing like that. This is not losing the connection and their grip on reality, this is _drifting_.

Raleigh experimentally tries to show a specific memory to Chuck, and is rewarded when a scene of him and Yancy playing tag out in the garden when they were small children flares to life in the space between them.  Raleigh can hear and feel Chuck’s scoff at the sentimentality of the memory, so Raleigh explains in the silent, almost instantaneous way that only the drift can allow, ‘ _I miss him_.’

Unbidden, though, comes the memory of the fight with Knifehead. Raleigh tries to squash it, but at Chuck’s almost gentle, ‘ _Stop that_ ,” he relents, and allows the feelings to just wash over him.

He knows Chuck feels everything he had on that fateful night. The indescribable pain that shot down Raleigh’s arm and seared his flesh as Knifehead had ripped off Gipsy’s arm, the sensation whiting out Raleigh’s field of vision. The dawning horror as the monster’s claws had pierced the conn pod. The certainty that they were both about to die, though whether that came from Yancy or Raleigh himself, the blond still isn’t sure. The sensation of being lifted up and away—which was definitely from Yancy—and surrounded in inky blackness and then… nothing; silence. The fire that ravaged Raleigh’s entire body as Gipsy desperately tried to remain functioning with him as the only nexus for the neural load while he’d screamed and screamed and _screamed_ in pain and denial and loss. How he’d somehow steeled himself using his despair ( _gonegonegonehe’sgonehecan’tbegoneYancywhereareyounononono_ ) as a shield and managed to kill Knifehead by overloading the remaining plasmacaster even as the kaiju had continued to tear into Gipsy’s body, the neural feedback from the injuries practically nonexistent when compared to the solitude in Raleigh’s mind where just minutes ago there’d been _life_ and _love_ and _Yancy_. The emptiness he’d been able to hold at bay just long enough to force his shuddering, seizing body to bring the Jaeger back to shore. The way that same emptiness, that feeling of _void_ , had finally enveloped his mind after he’d crawled out of the Gipsy’s corpse, Yancy’s name on his lips, and sank into the welcome embrace of the dark and cold.

Chuck sees all of this, and Raleigh can almost feel the other ranger’s guilt over the way he’d antagonized Raleigh for running.

‘ _I never knew it was like that_.’

Raleigh flashes a quick vision to Chuck of what it’d been like trying to drift with Mako, trying to keep that piece of him—part of his mind and soul that was forever stained with the memory, the _experience_ , of his brother’s death—hidden away. Not because he didn’t think she could handle it, but because the memory would probably be too intense for someone so unused to drifting with another actual person. This, then, of course, leads inevitably to the memory of their fight being replayed between them. Raleigh feels Chuck’s anger and desperation because what he’d said had been true: he does want to come back alive. He feels Chuck’s anger swell when Raleigh reacts and hits him, knows Chuck feels his own anger being driven to the breaking point by this cocky little shit who knows _nothing_ about him, not really, then surprise when Raleigh executes a series of fighting moves that Chuck consciously remembers Mako using against him in their last sparring match. He feels Chuck’s embarrassment when Raleigh pins him and his father finds him there, bested by an _old man_ who hasn’t jockeyed in _five years_ for christ’s sake. Most surprisingly, though, he feels the thrill of arousal that goes through Chuck in that same moment, as Raleigh’s body is pressed flush against Chuck’s own, hard muscles obvious against Chuck’s back even through Raleigh’s bulky sweater as they bunch together in the effort of keeping Chuck down. Even more prominent, though, is the hatred Chuck feels towards himself in that moment, for allowing himself to become helpless against his will, for needing his father to come and rescue him again.

Raleigh raises a mental eyebrow at this, and Chuck simply shrugs and shows Raleigh the day his father came in a helicopter and retrieved Chuck from his primary school in Sydney. He shows Raleigh how he’d called his father earlier, crying, saying that the news said another monster was attacking and that they had to leave right away and he was scared because he didn’t have any way to get out and please come save me. He shows Raleigh how Herc had told him where to meet the helicopter before it arrived and the older man had jumped out, stone-faced and grim, and swept his sobbing son up into his arms, words like ‘I’ve got you kiddo, you’re safe now, I’ll take care of you,’ falling from his lips. He shows Raleigh how he’d come to a sort of quiet realization that, moments later, had him screaming at his father, asking why they were leaving the city, where was mom, why wasn’t she here—?

And that was when a miniature sun had bloomed on the horizon, blinding Chuck, the shockwaves and dull pain in his eyes drowning out his scream of frustration and futility.

He’s not sure if Chuck _means_ to show him what comes next, but he watches as the small boy Chuck had been comes to hate his father for what he’d done. How he’d thrown himself into his studies of the kaiju and Jaeger piloting and combat techniques. How he’d come to look at his father with a mixture of hatred and disgust because _he couldn’t save them both_. How he’d understood, on some level, that it wasn’t his father’s fault, but that had only driven his determination to new heights.

He saw how Chuck had learned about masturbation from one of the Lucky Seven techs when he was fifteen, and how he’d done it for the first time that night, his father’s name on his lips as his climax washed over him. How Chuck had been baffled until he realized that the hatred he held for his father had apparently morphed together with the love he used to hold for the man into something…more. Something that scared Chuck to death and yet still felt oh-so-right. How Chuck had drifted with Herc for the first time, and how he’d understood, for the first time, why Herc had gone back to save him: Chuck was his father’s everything, the point around which the man defined his success as a human being and a person. If Chuck died, then the only good thing Herc felt he had brought into the world would’ve been gone and none of it would’ve meant anything anymore. He’d seen what exactly he meant to his father, and it had awed him and enraged him all the same. And Herc, in turn, had seen the feelings Chuck had been harboring for him and been horrified at first. Raleigh saw how Chuck had done everything in his power to convince his father that it was okay, it wasn’t his fault, it was nothing the older man had done, he was just fucked-up, though that thought certainly didn’t make him want it any less. If anything, it made him want it more. Raleigh saw the moment Chuck had finally broken all of his father’s carefully crafted defenses. In the middle of a heated argument, he’d screamed at Herc, “You rescued me to take care of me so fucking _take care_ of me.” And it had been then that something in Herc’s eyes shifted and he’d dived forward, capturing his then-seventeen year old son’s lips with his own.

Chuck recoils as Raleigh brushes over his mind, trying to push him out again.

‘ _It wasn’t like that!_ ’ the Australian hurries to defend, explanation coming by way of a series of images flashed before Raleigh’s mind: Herc refusing to do anything more than kiss Chuck before he turned eighteen despite Chuck’s impatience; Chuck getting injured during one of their drops, and Herc nearly killing himself to take down the Kaiju that dared hurt his son; Herc holding on to Chuck after Herc had finally agreed to do more, the younger ranger clearly asleep as the older man gently stroked the sweaty hair out of his face, clearly a memory Chuck had acquired from the drift.

Chuck’s desperation is nearly palpable now, and his intent—to   _stop_ the series of images Raleigh had just viewed—comes across as clearly as his near-crippling shame at having such a vulnerable part of his life exposed to Raleigh.

‘ _It’s okay_ ,’ Raleigh assures him, thinks to himself for what feels like a few seconds, then sends out, ‘ _I understand_.’

When Chuck’s pulse of disbelief comes through the drift, Raleigh sighs internally and digs deep within himself, finding the memories he keeps hidden from even himself, and sends them across the drift to Chuck. The Australian had trusted him, whether intentionally or not, so it seemed only fair to offer the same trust in return. Chuck is clearly confused by what he’s seeing: Yancy with his hands tangled in Raleigh’s hair as he slots their mouths together, tongues winding against each other.

‘ _This was the first time_ ,’ Raleigh explains. ‘ _I was eighteen. We’d just killed our first kaiju together. I’d wanted him since I was fifteen. He knew, but this was the first time he’d actually gone along with it. I think us nearly dying is what did it._ ’

He sends Chuck a quick succession of images after that: Raleigh leaning over Yancy’s laid-out form, running his hands down his older brother’s sides as he rode his cock; Yancy’s eyes sparkling at him knowingly when jaeger flies tried to attract their attention; Yancy’s lips wrapped around him as his older brother gets down on his knees for him after their second kill, mouth stretched around his little brother’s girth. For perhaps a half second, Raleigh waits for the other man’s reaction, tension ratcheting up his spine.

Then Chuck’s disbelief gives way to understanding of his own.

‘ _I never knew_ ,’ the younger pilot whispers into the drift. Raleigh chuckles mentally.

‘ _A few people did. No one really cared, though. Sasha and Aleksis actually caught us going at it once. They laughed about it later, said it explained why we could drift so well_.’ The blond pauses before adding, ‘ _Y’know, I’m sure no one would give two shits about you and your dad. It’s kinda hot, actually_.’

To emphasize his point, he recalls the memory that started all of this: Chuck’s fantasy of Raleigh fucking him while Herc watched. Instead, Raleigh modifies the image and projects it back. Now, instead of Herc watching, he’s positioned behind Raleigh, cock driving home into the blond as Raleigh moans like he’s in heat and pulls Chuck’s face towards him to ravage the other ranger’s mouth.

Chuck’s arousal is almost palpable through the drift. However, through the storm of emotions and reactions the redhead has become, Raleigh manages to discern one, distinct phrase.

‘ _Oh,_ fuck _yes_.’

They throw themselves out of the drift at the same time with an almost practiced ease, as if they’ve been doing this together for years, and Raleigh knows from Chuck’s memories which latch to hit to unstrap himself from the pilot harness. He stumbles to the floor of the conn pod, carefully avoiding the pit in the center, rips off his helmet, and walks around the back to see that Chuck has done the same, a fire in his eyes that mirrors the heat in Raleigh’s belly. He almost falls over from the strength of the emotions coursing through his veins when he catches sight of that fire, but he manages to meet the younger man halfway without injury or in general making a fool out of himself.

Without a word, they both reach for each other, their lips finding each other. Raleigh feels a thrum of arousal deep in his chest, and for a moment he’s not sure if it’s coming from him or Chuck, because normally you don’t start ghosting with someone until you’ve drifted together half a dozen times but _damn_ this is intense. He feels Chuck’s tongue probe at his lips, and he opens immediately, letting the redhead take the lead.

Kissing Chuck is nothing like kissing Yancy, he soon realizes. Where Yancy was tender and caring and always making sure Raleigh was alright, was okay, was happy, Chuck is a force of nature. He’s all teeth and tongue and intensity and he dives into Raleigh’s mouth seeking what he wants and he _takes_ it. Raleigh moans at the feeling of Chuck’s tongue in his mouth, rubbing his own over it and tasting coppery blood, probably leftover from their fight earlier, and, beneath that, something that is both sweet and bitter at the same time but undeniably, uniquely, _Chuck_. The redhead groans into his mouth in response, and the vibrations as they travel through Raleigh’s jawbone make his cock, which had been at half-mast already, spring to life in his drivesuit. He grunts in surprise and slight discomfort—the armor was never made to account for popping a fucking boner in it—and Chuck makes a sort of half-moan, half-laughing sound when Raleigh squirms.

“Got a bit of a problem, eh Ray?” he mocks the older man before diving back in to lick into Raleigh’s mouth again. This time, though, Raleigh takes control of the kiss, grabbing fistfuls of dirty-blond-red hair and _tugging_ , drawing a surprised gasp from the other man as his eyes fly wide, pupils dilating almost comically. Raleigh takes advantage of Chuck’s momentary distraction to dive in, massaging and mapping the contours of Chuck mouth with his own tongue and committing them to memory, keeping note of the spots that draw surprised, pleased gasps from the younger man. He also takes note of the way Chuck’s body almost instinctually relaxes in his grip when he tugs ever-so-slightly harder, as if submitting to such a display is as natural for the redhead as breathing. Thinking back to what he saw in the drift, Raleigh wonders if maybe that’s not so far off.

Pulling back and looking down, he sees Chuck wiggling his hips slightly, obviously in mild discomfort.

“Your room, _now_ ,” Raleigh commands, pulling back from Chuck to head for the hatch and the emergency walkway that should be just behind the conn pod once it’s nestled on top of Striker’s shoulders. Chuck, of course, whines at the loss of contact. Raleigh rolls his eyes in a manner that is dangerously close to fond.

“Unless you’ve got power tools nearby, there’s no way we’re getting these suits off,” he answers the unasked question.

Chuck growls in frustration, words seemingly beyond him. He gestures around them, to the conn pod’s interior, then between them, clearly indicating the vision they’d shared of them in this very spot.

“But,” Chuck starts, but Raleigh cuts him off.

“Next time,” he promises.

Chuck blinks once. Twice. Three times in surprise. Then he strides over to the harnesses where Herc’s voice has been repeatedly asking if they’re okay, what’s going on, why did they exit the drift?

“Dad,” Chuck says huskily into the comm, voice sounding hoarse— _wrecked_ , Raleigh thinks to himself with no small amount of pride—and almost blatantly sexed, his eyes not breaking from Raleigh’s as he stops his father mid-question. “Quarters. Ten minutes. Move it, old man.”

They somehow manage to divest themselves of their drivesuits in record time and run to Chuck and Herc’s quarters hand-in-hand, earning themselves a number of odd looks from the techs and scientists they pass in the hallways as they weave between the crowd. They make it back to the room in just over five minutes.

Before the door is even fully shut, Chuck launches himself at Raleigh, eliciting a grunt of surprise from him as the redhead pulls the blond’s shirt from his body and goes to work running his tongue over the hard lines of muscle that were previously hidden from sight. Raleigh shudders at the contact, hands coming down to fist in the redhead’s locks, gripping tightly in encouragement as he cranes his neck upward to expose himself more to the younger man. A groan of appreciation rumbles deep in his chest, and his eyes slip closed as he revels in the sensations.

Chuck apparently takes advantage of Raleigh’s distraction, because the next thing Raleigh knows he’s been pushed backwards until the backs of his knees hit the bed. He takes a moment to note that the bed, singular, in the room is actually two single beds pushed together, and then Chuck forces him down, following. He latches on to Raleigh’s left nipple, suckling and biting at the nub of flesh as sparks dance under Raleigh’s skin, then follows the circuitry scars that lead down to the older man’s ribs. He pays special attention to these, as if he knows what they mean to Raleigh, how they’re a memento from his last, horrible moment with Yancy. Though, Raleigh muses, given that they’d just drifted, it’s entirely possible that Chuck _does_ know. The thought gives him a strange sense of comfort, and Chuck looks up at him in surprise.

“What the fuck was _that_?” He asks sharply, and all Raleigh can do is look down into the kid’s blue-grey-green eyes and grunt questioningly in response.

“You know what,” Chuck bites out, panting lightly. “That, that… _feeling_ or whatever the fuck it was. Wait, are we,” his face pales, and Raleigh thinks it’s adorable how it makes the kid’s freckles stand out, “are we fucking _ghost drifting_?”

“Don’t know don’t care,” Raleigh grits out, pulling Chuck back up towards him by the front of the younger ranger’s shirt to engage his mouth in far more productive activities than talking. Chuck seems to agree with him after a momentary struggle, then he’s scrabbling at the bottom of his own shirt and tugging it off, pulling away from Raleigh for a moment so that he can pull the offending garment above his head. Raleigh openly ogles the body above him. Chuck was, he knew, bullheadedly stubborn about being the best in everything he did, including maintaining his physical conditioning. The twenty-one-year-old’s body was a testament to that devotion; muscles flexing and rolling as he held himself above Raleigh so beautifully it would’ve made a Greek sculptor weep. He reaches out and runs a hand along the defined ridges of Chuck’s abs almost reverently, secretly delighted in the light dusting of reddish-brown hair that thickens as it passes the other ranger’s belly button and continues southward. Raleigh resists the urge to trace that path immediately, and instead flattens his hand and runs it back up Chuck’s side, noting with delight the way he shivers under Raleigh’s tender ministrations. He pulls his nails back down the path his fingers just traced, then grabs Chuck’s still-clad hips in a bruising grip and pulls the younger ranger down on top of him.

The feeling of their bodies meeting for the first time is almost euphoric. It feels like miles upon miles of contact, and Raleigh can’t seem to get enough of it. He grabs handfuls of the muscles of Chuck’s back, clawing at them, leaving red welts, and he feels Chuck scrabbling at him, doing the same. Raleigh kisses him fervently, desperately, trying to keep as much of his body in contact with the other man’s as he can, reveling, _drowning_ , in it. He gives a surprised gasp and bites at Chuck’s tongue by accident when he feels fingers skirt under the front of his pants, tickling at the skin under his waistband. Instead of complaining, though, Chuck moans and does it again, and Raleigh chuckles to himself as a thread of surprise and desire curls over what he’s beginning to accept is a wisp of a ghost drift between them. He bites at Chuck’s tongue again, none too gently, and the redhead practically whimpers above him.

Raleigh flips them over, loving the way Chuck’s body goes lax beneath him, and dives down to attack Chuck’s neck. He sucks and licks and teethes at the skin there, working until he finds a spot just beneath Chucks ear—along the tendon that runs up his neck—that makes him arch in surprise again.

“Oh fuck,” Chuck groans when Raleigh attacks the spot again and again, and he whimpers when Raleigh bites hard enough to leave a bruise. Raleigh doesn’t relent, though, and continues teething and licking at the abused skin until it’s flushed a satisfactory shade of red that he just _knows_ will turn purple within the hour. A rush of possessiveness fills him when he catches sight of the mark, and he growls low in his throat before claiming Chuck’s mouth again, which had before then been open as he panted into the air behind Raleigh’s ear, murmuring low phrases such as, “ _Fuck_ yeah, Ray,” or just making incoherent gasping noises of pleasure. When Raleigh reclaims the younger man’s mouth, though, he shifts to making small noises at the back of his throat, practically mewling into Raleigh’s lips.

Raleigh is completely unsurprised when Chuck’s hands scrabble at the button of his pants, fingers trying to pop it open, having little success, likely due to the awkward angle and the small amount of space he has to work with. He lets out a frustrated huff, eyes flying open to glare when Raleigh pulls back from kissing him and chuckles lightly.

“Here, let me,” he says, but Chuck growls again, eyes flashing dangerously, and works at the button until he’d manages to get it undone. Raleigh just chuckles again, and lifts himself up a bit to allow the redhead room to work as he feels his zipper being pulled down next. However, Chuck surprises him by, instead of just pulling down his pants, grasping the waistband of his underwear and pulling it and his pants off simultaneously, leaving him naked, and _incredibly_ hard, above Chuck. He lets out an involuntary little gasp as the cold air of the Shatterdome strikes his naked flesh, a sound that repeats itself when Chuck reaches up, grabs his ass, and _squeezes_. Raleigh retaliates by diving forward and drawing the Australian's lips into his mouth and biting down, which transforms Chuck’s victorious chuckle into a gasp of his own.

“You’re wearing too much,” Raleigh quips at him, arching an eyebrow.

Chuck’s response is to flip them over again, kneeling as his fingers dance over his pants to quickly shuck the material and thin boxers he’s wearing underneath. Raleigh takes yet another moment to take in Chuck, holding a hand against the redhead’s chest to prevent him from crashing them back together right away.

“Hold on,” he murmurs softly. “I wanna look.”

Now he does take the opportunity to follow Chuck’s treasure trail to its destination, fingers dancing through the red-brown curls that outline the base of Chuck’s not-so-little cock. Raleigh teases his fingertips around the base, around behind the pilot’s balls—which gets him a full-body shiver—and then back up the other side before he moves in a teasing line up one side of Chuck’s shaft and down the other.  He takes a moment to also follow the lines formed by the V of Chuck’s hips, tracing the rows and patterns of lean muscle on display. Chuck shudders again under his gaze, eyes suddenly, for some reason, unsure and, unless Raleigh’s misreading the ghosting between them, a little bit scared; he’s no longer looking Raleigh in the eye.

“Hey,” he says, trying to put as much sincerity behind the words as he can. “Look at me.”

He places his palm on Chuck’s cheek, forcing the redhead to look at him.

“You’re beautiful, Chuck,” he tells the younger pilot, trusting in the ghost drift between them and his unrelenting gaze back into the other pilot’s eyes to convey how true his words are.

For a moment, Raleigh is afraid that Chuck is going to respond with a cocky, “Of course I am, mate,” but instead he grins lightly, flashing dimples Raleigh hadn’t known were there, and dives back down, lowering his body until it’s flush against Raleigh’s. Raleigh lets out a surprised gasp at the contact, not expecting the younger ranger’s skin to be so _hot_ against his without any barriers of cloth between them. He wraps his arms around Chuck, returning the favor for the redhead’s actions earlier and runs his nails down Chuck’s back, delighting in the gasps the act produces as Chuck writhes under his touch.

And then their cocks grind together, and Raleigh can’t restrain the moan from leaking from between his lips. If he’d thought Chuck’s whole body was hot, the other man’s erection is god damn _molten steel_ against his own hardness. He thrusts his hips upward as he grabs Chuck’s hips and pulls the younger man down on top of him, the added friction drawing another moan out of him as Chuck shudders and makes a choked sound at the back of his throat, hips thrusting down into Raleigh’s grip seemingly of their own accord.

Which is, of course, when Herc flings the door open, panting, eight minutes and fifty seven seconds after his son had commanded him to meet them. Raleigh spares a glance over towards where Chuck’s father is standing, watches as mild shock registers on the man’s face. Had he not been expecting the blond? The expression is replaced with a look laden with such intense _heat_ it makes Raleigh’s toes curl in anticipation. Chuck hardly seems to notice the intrusion, nor care that, as Herc is just standing there in the doorway, anyone could walk by and see them rutting against each other like two animals in heat. Instead, he thrusts down onto Raleigh, eliciting a grunt from the blond at the friction and heat, and he has to grit his teeth together to keep himself from moaning aloud with the door open. Chuck, however, seems to have no such worries, and he thrusts again, moaning _loudly_. The sound seems to jar Herc out of his staring contest with the edge of Raleigh’s vision, because he hurriedly enters the room fully and shuts the door behind him.

Gratefully, Raleigh returns his attention to Chuck once the door is closed, hand coming up to the redhead’s neck and pulling him down to capture his lips again, thumb reaching around to press against the mark he’d made on Chuck’s neck earlier. Chuck draws in a sharp breath through his nose, and his cock throbs against Raleigh’s hip when the younger pilot’s next thrust drifts off-target.

“He likes it when you mix in a bit of pain with his pleasure,” comes Herc’s voice from beside them. Raleigh suddenly finds himself chilled slightly as the older man buries his strong fingers in Chuck’s hair and _pulls_ , forcing the young man’s back into an arch as he moves with the motion. Chuck draws a pained hiss through his teeth that transforms into a wanton moan on the exhale when Herc latches into the side of Chuck’s neck opposite from where Raleigh has already marked it, biting down harshly enough that Raleigh sees the muscles in the man’s jaw flex before he brings his lips over his teeth and pulls back, kissing the rapidly-forming bruise. Chuck’s whole body is shuddering on top of Raleigh as his father—who has moved on to another spot that Raleigh apparently hadn’t found at the point where the same tendon meets Chuck’s clavicle—works him over, his hip thrusts becoming erratic as he mindlessly chases any kind of friction he can find. Raleigh smirks and takes pity on the younger pilot, wrapping his hand around Chuck’s bobbing erection.

The sound that comes out of Chuck’s mouth is almost a sob, and he pushes his cock through Raleigh’s grip with abandon as Herc’s hand comes around the kid’s chest to trace patterns only they know into his skin. Raleigh can only stare, transfixed, as Herc moves his mouth up to Chucks ear and licks and bites at the shell of cartilage before whispering something in his son’s ear that has the younger redhead biting his lip and nodding frantically. Herc chuckles darkly, hand that had been tracing over Chuck’s chest coming up to push ruthlessly at the marks both he and Raleigh have left on the younger’s skin as Raleigh uses his free hand to scrape his nails down Chuck’s chest and abs. Chuck _screams_ at the combination of inputs, from both Raleigh’s hands and his father’s, and comes in arcing streaks onto Raleigh’s chest. Only then does the older man relax his grip on the red-brown locks in his grasp.

Herc chuckles again as Chuck slumps, wrapping his arms around his son to catch him as he goes limp.

“Needy little fucker,” the older man breathes into the ensuing, almost tender, silence. “Gotta get him to come at least once first or else he’ll last no time at all later. And when _that_ happens, well, he gets t’ be a whiny fucker instead a’ just needy.”

Chuck grunts in protest, but mewls softly when Herc runs his hands down the side of his neck and over his shoulder, fingers brushing over the marks both men have left in his skin.

“F-fuck you, old man,” Chuck manages to get out before Herc growls low and grabs Chuck’s hair in a grip so tight Raleigh can see the tendons in his hands standing out in stark relief, pulling the redhead back even further, back bowing almost comically.

“Told you not t’ call me that,” Herc whispers dangerously, lips closing over his son’s mouth in a mess of clacking teeth and tongue. Raleigh can hear the needy noises Chuck makes as Herc swallows them down, and subtly tries to shift to ease the pressure that’d been building earlier when he and Chuck had been rutting into each other. He runs a hand down Chuck’s chest soothingly, palm ghosting over the welts his nails had left moments before. He moves his grip down until he finds his fingers flitting over the meat of Chuck’s thigh, fingers sinking in for a brief moment with bruising force that draws a surprised gasp from between Chuck’s lips that seems to also call Herc’s attention to Raleigh’s predicament. He pulls back from his assault on his son’s mouth.

“Chuck, don’t leave ranger Becket hangin’,” the older man whispers, the sound far more filthy than the shaped rushing of breath should have any right to be. “Help him out, would ya?”

Chuck simply hums in agreement. At least, Raleigh assumes it’s agreement, because, the next thing he knows, Chuck is sliding down his body and swallowing his cock down with an almost animalistic urgency and not a shred of preamble. Raleigh’s entire world narrows to the heat and wetness of Chuck’s mouth, and he lets out a strained, “Oh my god, _Chuck_ , holy _shit_.”

Chuck simply hums again and bobs up and down Raleigh’s length, clearly having extensive practice. His tongue laves at Raleigh’s shaft as he slides up and down, and swipes under the most sensitive parts of Raleigh’s glans and _sucks_ when he has just the head in his mouth. Then, he dives back down until Raleigh feels his cockhead brushing against the back of Chuck’s throat, the muscles fluttering oh so invitingly but refusing him entrance. Every so often, he’ll pull off slightly farther and tongue at Raleigh’s slit, the sensations the action produces teetering on the border between pleasure and pain as Raleigh’s body tries to decide how to classify this new experience. Through the lightning bolts of pleasure streaking through his body that reduce him to a babbling mess, Raleigh becomes aware that Herc is speaking again.

“Gotta use a bit more force than that, mate,” he’s saying, and the older man reaches out and grips Raleigh’s hand in his own and places it on top of Chuck’s head. “He likes it to be a little rough. Really loves gagging on a cock, actually.”

And with that, Herc tangles Raleigh’s hand in Chuck’s hair and, on Chuck’s next downstroke, pushes through Raleigh’s grip and forces Chuck’s head further down on Raleigh’s cock. Raleigh can feel more than hear Chuck gagging as Raleigh’s cock pushes insistently at the back of his throat. Then, the fluttering muscles give way and relax, and Raleigh’s cock slides into the tight confines of Chuck’s throat.

Raleigh almost comes right then and there. His fingers tighten instinctively in Chuck’s hair as his whole body tenses like a bow, and he has to bite down on his lip so hard he tastes blood to prevent himself from crying out. The feel of Chuck’s throat muscles massaging his cock is indescribable, and the feeling only intensifies in the moment that he feels something brush against his pelvis. Looking up, he realizes it’s Chuck’s nose; the redhead has the entirety of Raleigh’s cock in his mouth, and his watering, lust filled eyes are locked onto Raleigh’s face beneath the arm that’s forcing him further down.

“Good boy,” Herc murmurs from beside Raleigh, hand pressing more firmly on top of Raleigh’s despite the fact that Chuck can literally go no further. “Take that American cock, baby. Take it all the way.”

Chuck makes a sound that is somewhere between a hum of agreement and a moan of pleasure at the words. Raleigh feels the sound travel up his cock and resonate shocks of pleasure throughout his whole fucking _body_.

He does come at that, his world fading to white, hand falling from Chuck’s head. Faintly, he’s aware of Herc’s further words of encouragement—“That’s it, baby, you can do it, swallow it all.”—and the feeling of Chuck’s muscles working around him as the younger pilot drinks down everything he has to offer. Then, there’s an obscene squelching sound, and the heat around his cock vanishes. Raleigh looks groggily down to see that Chuck has pulled off of him and is coughing and gasping for air, cheeks flaming red. Chuck’s dick, though, is rock hard again, the sight abolishing any thoughts Raleigh might’ve had that the young Australian might not have enjoyed what just happened. It also serves to get a feeble twitch out of Raleigh’s spent cock, and he groans in frustration at the tempting sight, flopping back on the bed and trying to regain his breath.

The sound of a belt buckle being undone alerts Raleigh that Herc is nowhere in sight, but, before he can look around, the older man steps back into his field of vision, now completely naked. Raleigh gulps quietly at the package Herc is sporting. Raleigh’s not small by any means—he’s slightly above average, if he’s honest with himself—but the cock swinging between the older Australian’s legs puts Raleigh to shame in both length and girth. Raleigh’s pretty sure he would be hard-pressed to wrap a single hand around the other man and have his thumb meet one of his fingertips.

Raleigh finds his entire body overcome with a dizzying wave of desire.

Herc seems to feel the direction of Raleigh’s gaze, because he meets the blond’s gaze and smirks.

“If you’re good for Chuck, mate, I might even let you take a ride.”

Before Raleigh can even question what the older man means, Herc takes control with a practiced ease. He stands beside where Chuck is kneeling on the end of the bed, reaches down to cup the younger pilot’s face and turn it towards his own, and whispers audibly, “Show daddy how much you want his cock.”

The words set off some kind of reaction within Chuck, as the redhead immediately groans deep in his chest and leans forward until he’s on his hands and knees, ass sticking up and out. Herc lowers himself until his face is level with Chuck’s hole, whispers a soft, “Good boy,” then pries Chuck’s ass cheeks apart and dives in, tongue darting out to lap at the puckered hole presented to him. Now that his mouth is not otherwise occupied, though, Chuck becomes the mouthy shit Raleigh always expected him to be in bed.

“Yeah, oh fuck, yeah, just like that, christ, oh fuck dad, _god_ , fuck, _yes_ —” The litany of filth never ceases, colorful swear words thrown into the mix that Raleigh’s never before heard, and only lets up when Herc moves back a bit, which draws an almost pained sound out of Chuck, and when the older man dives back in, which results in a deep moan.

“Fucking hell, dad, yeah, fucking— _fuck_ —oh _fuck_ yes, don’t fuckin’ stop, gettin’ me all fucking wet old man, _fuck_ —”

Raleigh finds his dick, which had before then only made feeble attempts at coming back to hardness, beginning to fill with blood once more as Chuck’s words wash over him. However, it’s nothing compared to when Herc pulls away with a lewd squelching sound and wipes his mouth on the back of his hand, gaze locked on Raleigh.

“C’mere,” the elder commands him. “I’m gonna shut ‘m up.” (“Fuck you, old man!”) “Take over, would’ya?”

Raleigh practically trips over himself getting to the edge of the bed as Herc moves towards Chuck’s head (“What the fuck makes you think you can make me—!”), gripping the redhead’s hair between expert fingers and pushing Chuck down onto his impressive length. The young pilot taking the whole thing as easily as breathing, obligatory protests dying the moment the older man’s cock makes contact with his tongue. Raleigh literally stops breathing for a moment, gaze transfixed on the sight of Herc’s cock disappearing into Chuck’s mouth only to reappear a second later as Chuck gags and gasps for air before disappearing again.

“Don’t leave ‘m hangin’, Becket,” Herc admonishes Raleigh, hips now thrusting into Chuck’s mouth as his hands hold the pilot’s head steady. Raleigh almost laughs at the way Herc uses the same words on both him and Chuck, but decides against it and instead practically dives towards Chuck’s spit-slicked hole. He laps and licks at the ring of muscles, drawing the most delicious moans out of Chuck that have Herc giving appreciative groans in sympathy. Raleigh takes a moment to relish in that same bitter-and-sweet taste from before that he’s come to identify as purely _Chuck_ and the smoky undercurrents that he assumes must be from Herc, then he stiffens his tongue and pushes at the muscle, teasing it apart and breaching it ever so slightly.

Chuck practically falls apart, moans turning up in both pitch and volume. Herc looks up, surprised. Raleigh repeats the motion experimentally, pushing his tongue ever-so-slightly further inside of the younger pilot and twisting it slightly.

Chuck actually pulls off of his father’s cock at that, burying his face in the sheets and _screaming_. Raleigh is so alarmed that he immediately pulls out and back, lifting his hands as if to say ‘I didn’t do anything, I swear.’

Chuck’s annoyance screeches through their ghost drift like Gipsy’s foghorn, the redhead lifting his head and glaring at Raleigh at the loss of sensation. Over top of him, Herc looks torn between murder and curiosity.

“Did I say to fucking stop, _Rah_ leigh?”

“N-no—” Raleigh stammers out.

“Then _don’t fucking stop¸_ you useless sod,” Chuck yells at him, gaze hardening in silent challenge.

Something steely settles itself in Raleigh’s gut, and, instead of responding verbally, he pulls Chuck’s ass cheeks apart again and dives in, tongue pushing at the younger pilot’s hole until he breaches it again and swirls around, stretching the ring of muscle with his tongue alone. The redhead practically sobs from pleasure, the endless parade of filth—“Jesus fuck Ray, I have no idea what the fuck you’re doing but _fuck me do not stop don’t you fucking dare_ ”—starting up momentarily before it’s cut off by Herc sliding home once more. They continue like this, the sounds of Chuck’s whimpers and groans filling the room as Herc whispers filth to his son and words of encouragement to Raleigh after informing the blond that he _will_ be teaching the older man that particular trick later.

Chuck’s groans change in timbre and intensity again, gaining a more desperate edge, and Herc seems to take that as some kind of signal because he pulls out of Chuck’s throat with a filthy sound of flesh sliding on wet flesh and commands Raleigh to stop what he’s doing.

“He’s ready,” is all the older man says by way of explanation. He leans over to the nightstand and pulls out a bottle of lube and tosses it to Raleigh with one hand, the other hand gripping Chuck’s face and neck as he directs the redhead to turn over. “Start with two fingers. He can take it. Like I said, little fucker likes it rough.”

Raleigh uncaps the lube and slathers his digits with it, allowing it to warm for a moment before doing as directed. His middle and index finger slide into Chuck without any resistance, and he thrusts them in and out several times as Chuck hums in appreciation. He knows when he finds the younger pilot’s prostate, though, because Chuck’s entire body goes tense and he lets out a hoarse shout of surprise and pleasure, fingers scrabbling at the sheets.

“Switch to three,” Herc commands him, and Raleigh obeys, sliding his fingers out to coat his ring finger in lube before sliding back in, encountering some resistance this time. Chuck hisses as Raleigh spreads his fingers around, stretching the redhead, but then moans again when Raleigh quickly locates that round nub of flesh within him once more. He’s breathing heavily, chest moving up and down so fast Raleigh is surprised the young ranger isn’t hyperventilating. The way Chuck’s eyes are flung open, staring sightlessly at the ceiling, the way his mouth hangs open in a loose “O”; the way his entire body responds to Raleigh’s touch, like the blond is his puppet master. It brings a singular thought to Raleigh’s mind that he blurts out without even thinking about it.

“So fucking beautiful, Chuck…”

He quickly snaps his mouth shut, though, looking to where Herc is kneeling above Chuck’s head with an apology on his lips. However, the older man’s smile stays his words.

“He is, ain’t he?” Herc asks him, smile becoming dangerously close to fond. However, Herc’s smile drops into a light frown when Chuck leans up and murmurs, “Are you both gonna sit there and gawk at my fucking beautiful face or is someone gonna _fuck me_?”

“Oi, show some respect,” the older man growls, leaning over Chuck’s body to grab the redhead’s legs and pull them further back, giving Raleigh even better access. “Becket, he’s good. If he can mouth off, he can take a cock, no problem.”

Raleigh can’t help the grin that breaks out on his face at the words.

“Yes sir,” he replies mildly, slicking up his cock and positioning it at Chuck’s entrance. However, before he dives in, he looks up at Herc and asks, stone-faced, “Do I have your permission to engage in pilot to pilot protocols with your son, ranger Hansen?”

“You have got to be fuckin’—are you fuckin’ _kidding me,_ you—?” Chuck starts angrily, but the words get cut off into a groan when Herc nods at Raleigh and the blond pushes past the outer ring of muscle, the inner ring of muscle, and doesn’t stop until he’s fully seated inside the pilot beneath him.

Like with everything else he’s done tonight, Raleigh has to stop for a moment and catch his breath, fighting the urge to come right away.

“Jesus _fuck_ ,” Raleigh grits out, trying to keep himself from moving.

Chuck’s ass is _so tight_. It feels like the redhead is trying to suck him in deeper and push him out at the same time as Chuck’s internal muscles flutter over his length, caressing it like a long-lost friend. The redhead hasn’t stopped writhing since Raleigh first slid about halfway in. Evidently, he’d gotten Chuck’s prostate on the first try. To test this theory, once he’s sure he’s not going to fucking _explode_ , Raleigh rotates his hips a little, corkscrewing his cock in Chuck’s guts.

Chuck just makes an incoherent babbling noise. Raleigh does it again, delighting in the way the younger pilot reacts when he’s so overstimulated like this. Hesitantly, he pulls back until half his cock is buried inside of Chuck, then pushes back in, moaning as the overwhelming, vise-like grip of the redhead’s ass clamps down on his shaft once more. He repeats the motion a few more times until he’s sure Chuck’s not in any pain, then he pulls back until just his cockhead is inside of Chuck—the groan of complaint he receives is almost ( _almost_ ) adorable—the flared edges of his cockhead peeking into view, before pushing forward and sheathing himself completely once more. Chuck’s groan intensifies in volume.

“God damn it, fuck you, you _bastard_ , you _had it_ , fucking _get it back_.”

Raleigh starts at the words spilling from Chuck’s mouth, looking to Herc for guidance. The older man chuckles and peers at where Raleigh is joined with his son. Absently, he slips his own cock between Chuck’s lips, blocking out his son’s complaining.

“Pull back,” he instructs. Raleigh does so, pulling out until only half of his length remains inside the younger ranger again.

“Farther.”

He pulls back until only about an inch remains inside of Chuck.

“Angle down a bit.”

Raleigh lifts his hips fractionally.

“Bit more.”

When Raleigh does as instructed, Herc smiles down at him, the expression positively solar in its intensity.

“Now. Give it all to him. Hard. I told y’ before, fucker likes it.”

So, taking Herc’s words to heart, the blond slams his hips forward, not holding back. The sound of his pelvis smacking against Chuck’s ass is drowned out by the _scream_ of pleasure Chuck lets out around Herc’s cock in his mouth.

“Yeah, mate,” Herc encourages Raleigh. “Just like that. Right there. Go for it.”

So Raleigh does. Making sure to keep his angle the same, he grips Chuck’s thighs and repeatedly pulls back until he feels the heating air of the room against his cock’s length before he thrusts right back into the younger pilot. The redhead’s screams of pleasure taper off as, Raleigh assumes, his vocal chords become unable to sustain such a constant level of sound, transforming instead into a series of loud moans, grunts, and some kind of quavering sound that remind Raleigh of Chuck’s sobs earlier. A few times, he actually slips out all the way by accident, but when he looks down he sees that Chuck’s hole is winking and open from the pounding he’s giving it, so he simply moves his hips until the head of his cock rests against the gaping, stretched muscle and pushes inside without bothering to move his hands from where they’re holding Chuck’s legs in place. After the first few times, Raleigh notices that Chuck gets closer to screaming again when this happens, so he starts to do it on purpose. Eventually, his rhythm becomes one of constantly pulling all the way out and simply pushing himself back into the willing body beneath him.

After a few more minutes of this, Raleigh leans forward, propping Chuck’s knees on his shoulders, pulling the redhead even wider open than before. He brings his head down, mouthing at Chuck’s lips and Herc’s cock where it disappears between them. The disadvantage of this position is that it makes it so that Raleigh can’t pull out completely because the angle is too extreme, but this is counterbalanced by the fact that, judging by the noises Chuck is making beneath him, Raleigh’s putting constant pressure on the younger man’s prostate. Also, Raleigh is finally able to get his mouth on Herc’s cock, even if it’s not the whole thing.

However, something happens. Herc pulls out of Chuck’s mouth, drawing a moan of complaint from the younger man until Herc whispers, “I want to see you two together.” After that, the complaining is gone in an instant and Chuck’s arms are scrabbling from where they’d been fisting the sheets to claw at Raleigh’s back. Raleigh drops his head the scant few inches that’d been separating them and seals his mouth onto Chuck’s bruised, cocksucking-swollen lips.

The bottom falls out of Raleigh’s mind.

Where formerly there was Raleigh and Chuck, now there is only _RaleighandChuck_. Raleigh is no longer sure where he begins or Chuck ends; there simply is no longer a difference. He _feels_ _everything_ Chuck feels: can feel his own tongue tangling with Chuck’s—or is that Chuck’s tangling with his?—can feel his own cock sliding deep in his guts, can feel it relentlessly grinding against his prostate; can practically _swim_ in their combined pleasure as it courses through him, blotting out all coherent thoughts save one. He’s not sure which of them have the particular thought, but in the end it doesn’t matter because it’s what they both want. Raleigh’s head moves upward, away from Chuck’s lips.

“Dad, please,” the pleading voice physically comes out of Raleigh’s mouth, _RaleighandChuck_ trying to convey their _need_ to Herc. The man’s eyes widen in something the Chuck portion of them knows is alarm, and they try to soothe him, though one of them points out to them that having them both land identical, desperate gazes on the older man is not likely to help.

“Dad, it’s okay,” the voice comes out of Raleigh’s mouth again. “It’s just me. Please, Dad, please,” Raleigh’s mouth pleads, and then Chuck’s mouth opens to finish the sentence. “Please, Dad, you’ve got to fuck me. _Now_.”

Herc looks truly alarmed now, and the two of them wrestle to control this weird sensation within them. There’s no way they can explain it that will sound sane.

“Herc,” they try again, this time concentrating and using Raleigh’s mouth. “Please, Herc, _fuck_ me. I fucking need it. _Please_.”

Herc still looks dubious, although apparently switching to the older man’s first name was a good idea. One of them has an idea, and it’s flung out of Raleigh’s mouth almost instantly.

“ _Fuck me while I fuck your son_.”

At _that_ , Herc’s eyes darken, and they know they’ve won. He nods, then retrieves the bottle of lube from where Raleigh had left it up higher on the bed, crawling around behind Raleigh. He coats a finger and teases it around Raleigh’s entrance, the cold sensation making Raleigh shiver; then, before he slips inside, he looks up at the blond’s face where it’s turned in eager anticipation.

“You sure, Becket?”

“For god’s sake, fucking _fuck_ me already, Herc,” Raleigh’s voice whines in a decidedly Chuck-like fashion. Herc growls and pushes his finger into Raleigh’s hole to the last knuckle in one, quick thrust. The brief flash of pain up his spine helps Raleigh separate himself enough from Chuck that they’re still _RaleighandChuck_ , but he can at least speak through his own damn mouth, can control his own damn body on his own again. In whatever the fuck this thing is, he feels Chuck internally grimacing in sympathy at the burn he’s become so unaccustomed to but that Raleigh hasn’t had to combat for over five years. Not since Yancy.

“Oh fuck, Herc,” Raleigh breathes, relishing in the pain as it starts to abate and a faint pleasure replaces it instead. “Fucking give me more, _please_.”

Herc swirls his finger inside of Raleigh some more, presumably to stretch him a bit further, before he wiggles a second finger inside the American’s ass. Seconds after sliding in, though, the older Australian finds Raleigh’s prostate and massages it relentlessly.

“Oh my god!” Raleigh and Chuck cry out in unison at both the sensations Herc is shooting through their joined consciousness and the feeling as Raleigh’s hips, which had gone still when Herc had first breached him, thrust forward almost involuntarily, stabbing at Chuck’s prostate at the same time.

To say Raleigh nearly blacks out from the pleasure would be an underestimate of just how close his brain is to complete overload. He bucks backwards onto Herc’s fingers and forwards into Chuck, chasing their mutually impossible heights of pleasure.

“More,” Raleigh growls as Herc starts to scissor his fingers inside of him, the burn a welcome dash of pain with his pleasure. “Need _you_ , right fucking _now_.”

Herc raises a doubtful eyebrow at him.

“Mate, I don’t think that’s such a—”

“ _Now_ ,” Raleigh demands, _needing_ to feel that giant cock spearing him, splitting him open, splitting him in half. “I can take it, I promise. Just _give it to me_.”

Herc apparently needs no further convincing, as he slathers up his cock and places the blunt head at Raleigh’s entrance, applying slow but insistent pressure.

When the head pops in, Raleigh almost screams. Whether from pain or pleasure, he has no idea, he just knows that whatever this is he never wants it to fucking end, so he pushes back on the cock forcing its way inside of his barely-stretched hole, groaning happily when another few inches slip inside. He rocks his hips experimentally a few times despite the fact that Herc isn’t all the way inside of him yet, and is rewarded for his efforts when Herc’s fat cockhead practically smashes against his prostate.

The pain vanishes in an instant. Raleigh and Chuck both mentally cock their heads in confusion, well aware that’s not how it’s supposed to work. The hurt instead transforms into mind-numbing pleasure that blots out Raleigh and Chuck’s coherent thoughts.

“Fuck, Becket, do you have a switch or something?” Herc wonders aloud, voice almost reverent. “Yer ass just completely relaxed; how the fuck did y’do that?”

In answer, Raleigh simply moans, pushing back against Herc’s cock. Herc simply shrugs at the lack of an answer, and continues to slide inside of Raleigh, his thick girth a constant pressure that stretches Raleigh until he feels _whole_ and _complete_ in a way he hasn’t felt in years. Herc’s cock is so fat that he doesn’t have to even aim for Raleigh’s prostate: he just hits it by virtue of being _inside_ of the blond. When the older man was finally seated inside of him, Raleigh wiggled his ass experimentally, moaning both at the feeling of being so _full_ and the way his motions cause his own cock to press against Chuck’s prostate, both actions sending shockwaves of pleasure through the two men.

“Move,” Raleigh commands, panting.

“Not gonna last long like this,” Chuck adds, the two of them momentarily forgetting whose mouth they’re talking through.

The rest, though, is a blur. Herc pulls out and slams back into Raleigh with brutal force, his cock splitting the blond wide in the most delicious ways, forcing him to widen his stance to accommodate the impressive girth. At the same time, Raleigh and Chuck somehow manage to gather up the willpower to get Raleigh’s hips moving through the constant haze of pleasure and _more_ and _fuck_ , and they build up a rhythm with Herc where, as Herc pushes in, Raleigh pulls out and meets the older man halfway before sliding back into Chuck as Herc pulls out of Raleigh, essentially forcing Herc to longdick his ass while he pounds Chuck’s ass at an angle that makes it impossible to miss that sensitive bundle of nerves that’s making both of them lose their fucking minds. Chuck and Raleigh are both babbling incoherent sounds at this point, one of their hands joined above Chuck’s head as Raleigh uses it to brace himself, the other one tracing each other’s bodies as their mouths meld into a single line, tongues and teeth colliding with abandon every time either Raleigh or Herc thrusts forward.

All too soon, Raleigh becomes aware that his and Chuck’s pleasure is reaching a peak of some kind, and a whine builds up in the back of his throat as colorful swear words start falling from between Chuck’s lips. The summit is approaching with startling quickness, until, finally, Raleigh tips over the edge, emptying his load deep inside of Chuck and choking off a scream in Chuck’s mouth. He feels as well as _feels_ Chuck doing the same thing as he comes between their bodies, cock untouched, both their worlds vanishing into an endless expanse of white blankness.

Herc continues to pound into Raleigh’s oversensitized hole, pace relentless. Raleigh mewls at the overstimulation, and turns back towards Herc and whispers in a husky voice he isn’t sure belongs to him or Chuck, “Come on, Herc. Do it. Fill me up, Daddy.”

And then Herc is gone, too, cutting off his own shout by biting into the meat of Raleigh’s shoulder as he pumps his seed into Raleigh’s hole. Raleigh and Chuck’s world vanishes into pleasure again as the double sensation of being filled wracks their bodies with aftershocks.

They lay there, panting, shuddering occasionally, until Raleigh gets the courage to send an inquiring tendril down the ghost drift he and Chuck just shared, if that’s what that, in fact, was.

He gets nothing but a dull sense of contentment from the redhead. Apparently, whatever happened back there is gone. Raleigh finds himself both grateful to be the only one in his head again and missing the sensation of sharing that headspace with Chuck.

Behind him, Herc groans and slips his softening cock out of Raleigh’s ass. Raleigh feels empty without it there, can feel the small torrent of come that flows out of him and dribbles down his thigh. However, he can’t bring himself to care at the moment, too boneless to do anything except lay there. Well, anything except lay there and press slow, panting kisses to the corner of Chuck’s mouth that the redhead returns every now and then. He hears the sound of Herc standing and getting off the bed, then bare footfalls as the man comes around to near Chuck’s head. Raleigh sees one of Herc’s hands reach down and caress Chuck’s sleepy cheek where the redhead is sprawled on the mattress. The motion somehow both surprises and yet decidedly _does not surprise_ Raleigh with its tenderness.

Then, Herc moves the hand to Raleigh’s cheek and tips the blond’s head up.

Raleigh meets the older man’s eyes sleepily, with a blissed-out grin still firmly in place.

“Mm, yeah, Herc?” he asks softly. The older man chuckles at him, thumb tracing from Raleigh’s cheekbone to his jaw.

“I just wanted to let you know, Becket,” Herc starts, “that, we, I mean, I… ah, fuck it.”

Herc leans down towards Raleigh, his lips meeting the blond’s, and Raleigh admires how similar yet how different Herc’s kisses are from Chuck’s. Both are a force of nature, but Herc doesn’t simply _take_ : he _earns_. Raleigh feels compelled to deepen the kiss, opening his mouth to invite Herc to enter, which the older man promptly does. Raleigh was right, that smoky flavor was Herc, and it seems both Hansens share the same undercurrent of sweetness to them. After a few moments, Herc pulls away with a smack of lips.

“What I’m trying to say, Becket, is that if you ever wanna join us again, you’re more than welcome, eh? That was fucking mind blowing.”

“You have no idea,” comes Chuck’s sleepy mumble.

Raleigh can’t help it: he laughs. Perhaps one day he and Chuck will try to explain what happened to Herc. For now, though, he’s happy to have simply found this moment in his life: this comfort he and his fellow pilots can offer each other before they have to dive down into the depths of the Pacific a few days from now to face almost-certain death.

And maybe, he finds himself musing, maybe that’s all this will ever—could ever—be. Maybe this moment is the only one he’ll ever get with these two emotionally-stunted, beautiful men. Maybe not.

He’s certainly hoping for the latter.

Because, now… now he has something he thought he’d lost:

A reason to come back.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading, everyone!
> 
> As always, comments, especially constructive criticism, are welcomed and greatly appreciated. I'll try to reply to those of you who do take the time to comment as soon as I possibly can; you guys are my heroes.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Sweet Dreams](https://archiveofourown.org/works/1291645) by [jaeger_delta (deltasierra)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/deltasierra/pseuds/jaeger_delta)




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